Tequila
by a.k.a.-ashley
Summary: All it took was a bottle of tequila to help him see clearly. AU. Standalone.


**Tequila**

_A/N: Just another stand-alone piece while I attempt to get rid of the writer's block that is surrounding my chapter stories._

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He should have known better. 

Tequila was not Lucas Scott's friend. He had never been a big drinker but when he felt like letting go every once in a while tequila was his weapon of choice. Haley used to say that it was like his truth serum. A few shots of the stuff and it was impossible to get him to stop talking and that usually led to him revealing things he would regret when the hangover wore off.

Such was the case when he pulled out a half-empty bottle of Jose Cuervo from his and Haley's secret spot under her back porch one night. He brushed a bit of dirt from the peeling label, took a nip straight from the dusty bottle and let out a satisfied sigh.

"So what's going on tonight Lucas?" Haley questioned him.

"It's stupid and I don't really want to talk about it." Lucas mumbled.

"Well hey, that's fine we don't have to talk about it. I'll just wait until you get a little more tequila into your system and it will all come out in a big messy speech."

Lucas glared at her and took another drink from the bottle. "I saw Peyton with some guy at lunch, they looked pretty cozy."

"Well I hate to break it to you Lucas but she's not your girlfriend anymore and if I remember correctly you were the one who ended things between the two of you."

"Don't talk about things you don't know anything about Haley." One more long pull from the bottle and he handed it over to his companion.

The bottle had been emptied faster than they had anticipated. Lucas had gotten a little greedy with the bottle and had taken it from Haley after her initial drink, but she had never been a fan of the burning sensation in her throat that came with the beverage.

"Haley I need a favor." He slurred as he tossed the empty bottle back under the porch.

"What is it?"

"I need to see Peyton."

"There is no way I am taking you over there tonight." Haley shook her head, imagining the uncomfortable scene that would be created if Lucas managed to stumble up to Peyton Sawyer's door.

"Haley please, I'm begging you. I need to see her tonight."

"I'm not taking you over there while you're drunk Lucas, you'll just cause a scene."

"Well then I'll drive myself, because whether you take me or not I'm going over there. I just want to talk to her." Lucas knew Haley would never let him drive in his condition and alcohol just made him all the more stubborn. There was no way she was going to win an argument on this night.

"Fine. But I swear if you make a scene Lucas I'm dragging your ass home." She warned him as he made his way carefully down the steps towards her parked car in the driveway.

Minutes later he was slowly navigating his way up the steps of Peyton's front porch. He grabbed the doorframe to steady himself as he rang her doorbell more times than he needed.

Peyton answered the door clad in a pair of flannel pajama pants and a shaggy terry-cloth bathrobe. Lucas could see the look of surprise and hesitation on her face even through the blurred vision he had recently acquired.

"Lucas what are you doing here?" she asked with guarded concern.

He wasn't quick to respond, his attention was divided between forcing himself to stay upright and not losing the contents of his almost empty stomach all over her porch. She repeated the question with the addition of aggravation in her voice.

"I just wanted to see you. I thought we could talk or I could talk and you'd listen. I just, I just needed to see you Peyton." He stepped towards her and reached out a clumsy hand to brush away a loose strand of blonde curls that had fallen on her face. "You look beautiful."

She could smell the bitter liquid as soon as he pulled closer. "How much have you had to drink Lucas?"

"Not that much." He lied and she could see it in his eyes.

"Look I don't know what you want but it's late and I need to get to bed." Peyton turned to walk back into the house, wanting to slam the door shut on him.

"Peyton wait," he grabbed her arm, trying to gently turn her back to face him. "I saw you with that guy at lunch today and it, I don't know, it made me sick to my stomach seeing you with someone else."

"Well here's the thing about being broken up Lucas, it allows one the freedom to talk to and date whomever she wants without needing her ex's okay." Peyton wasn't about to tell Lucas that the guy he had seen her with at lunch was her Bio lab partner. She couldn't see how it was any of his business. Besides, she liked to see him squirm.

"No, I know that. I'm not saying you can't see other people."

"Well thank you for your permission with that." Peyton snapped at him. The last thing she wanted was to get into an argument with her drunk ex-boyfriend on her front porch. What _would_ the neighbors say?

"I miss you Peyton, and I know that I'm the one who ended things between us but god if I could take that decision back I would in a heartbeat. When I broke up with you it wasn't because things were going to fast, I was lying. And now that I have half a bottle of tequila in my system I can guarantee you that the real reason I broke up with you is because I was scared out of my mind. That is the truth."

"I guess this is where I'm supposed to ask what it was that you were scared of." She huffed.

"I was scared of getting hurt by you. Do you have any idea how deflating it is to the male ego to have a girl dump all over you, well neither do I but I can imagine that it must really suck and I just didn't feel like dealing with it. I don't care about that now, you can break my heart as many times as you want. I just want to be with you again." Peyton wondered if he would be on her porch spilling out his guts if tequila hadn't been involved. The words that were spilling out of his mouth were making him seem more than a little pathetic, and for a kid who was so worried about his fragile male ego none of what he was saying at that moment seemed to help that cause.

The longer he spoke, the more his words became increasingly mangled by the slur of his voice. He began to veer into incoherent rambling territory but Peyton could feel herself softening the defensive edge she had put up. The sadness in his eyes was heartbreaking for her to watch.

She was the first to admit that she had been thrown for a loop when Lucas suddenly ended things between them. Up until that moment she had believed that things were going well. It had hurt more than she imagined when he was gone, in the back of her mind she had always seen herself as the one who would ultimately hurt him. The irony had not been lost on her.

"How did you get here?" she asked him gently.

"Haley drove me."

"Just wait for me here Luke." Peyton made her way towards Haley's car and motioned for the girl to unroll her window.

"He's going to stay here with me Haley."

"Peyton no, I can take him home with me. You don't need to deal with this tonight, it's not your mess to clean up." Haley protested with her.

'It's alright Haley, he can stay here and I'll make sure he gets everything he needs."

Haley was gone minutes later as Peyton helped Lucas into the house.

"What's going on?" he asked as he stumbled on a corner of the Welcome mat outside her front door. Peyton caught his elbow, helping to break his fall but he ended up on the floor anyway. She looked on slightly annoyed as he burst into a fight of laughter.

"Come on Lucas, don't make me regret helping you." She helped him slowly to his feet and shut the front door behind her.

As they slowly climbed the stairs with his arm draped around her shoulder to help steady himself Lucas turned to her, his eyes drowsy from lack of sleep and too much liquor, and repeated the same thing that he had told her earlier. "I missed you Peyton, I should have never let you go."

"You're getting heavy, let's get upstairs." She tried changing the subject.

"No, Peyton I want you to know I'm serious. I mean every word."

"I know you do Lucas."

Minutes later he was sprawled across her bed, and she was at the end untying his shoes before she slipped them off and dropped them onto the floor by her bed. He had been slipping in and out of sleep, mumbling incoherently while he was awake. She took an opportunity to slip downstairs while he was awake and grab him some advil and a glass of water in an attempt to stave off the impending hangover Lucas would be dealing with in the morning. By the time she made it back to her room Lucas was out cold.

She slipped out of her bathrobe, draping it over the back of her desk chair, and with a flash of hesitance climbed into the bed next to him. She looked at the sleeping figure next to her and smiled to herself thinking that she should be more excited about a boy being in her bed.

"I missed you too Lucas." She whispered, knowing he couldn't hear her but hoping he might. She knew that things between them were more up in the air and confusing than ever, but she pushed those thoughts deeper into the back of her mind as she buried her face into his chest and drifted to sleep.

Lucas could feel the bright morning sun even before he opened his eyes. He was more surprised by the unfamiliar surroundings of the room he had woken in. Feeling the unbelievable throbbing in his temples he began to put the pieces of the night before together, he remembered the tequila and his desire to see Peyton and that was about it. It wasn't until he tried to reach up and rub the pain from his head that he noticed that his arm was pinned to the mattress by a head of blonde curls. She was still tangled in him from the night before, her fist clenched around a patch of his shirt keeping his body close to hers.

And suddenly his hangover wasn't so bad.


End file.
